'There's this spooky presence in Pendle Hill': Trace the footsteps of England's most famous accused witches

The borough of Pendle has been considered haunted ever since nine suspected witches were sent to their deaths there in 1612. Here's how curious visitors can trace their steps.

According to local legend, visitors to Pendle Hill are supposed to feel inexplicable feelings of anger, panic or dread. But as I reach the top of the 557m-high (1,8270ft) muddy escarpment in England's east Lancashire region, I mostly feel exhausted. And wet.

Yet, surrounded by the thick mist that often envelops the summit, it's impossible to deny a sense of unease. After all, this very area is where 12 Lancastrians were accused of witchcraft in 1612, leading to one of England's deadliest witch trials. Ever since, Pendle Hill's surrounding villages and ancient forests have been considered haunted.

Warning: This article contains details that some readers may find upsetting.

"There are rumours of ghostly and phantom monks, while people have reportedly experienced breathing difficulties there," says Stephen Oldfield, a Lancashire historian and author. According to tour guide Stephen Entwhistle, locals claim that the last piece of snow melting on Pendle Hill takes the shape of a witch.

Such tales have long lured visitors to Pendle Hill, particularly since the 400th anniversary of the trials in 2012. It's an especially popular jaunt around Halloween, when ghost-hunters try to connect with spirits allegedly haunting the borough's villages while enjoying some of the most underrated landscapes in northern England.

In early 17th-Century England, murder via witchcraft (alleged or otherwise) was already a capital offence. But the deeply superstitious king, James I, raised the stakes even higher with the Witchcraft Act of 1604, which deemed even non-fatal witchcraft – such as conjuring spirits and casting spells – punishable by death. The elderly and the poor were especially at risk of accusations, as were "cunning folk" claiming to be healers. "This was a time of great turmoil," says Oldfield. "People were very, very suspicious of anybody who didn't live what they considered to be a normal life."

The Pendle Hill witch panic began in March 1612 when folk healer Alizon Device encountered peddler John Law, who collapsed (or suffered a stroke) shortly afterward.

Law's son reported Device to local magistrate Roger Nowell, who investigated the incident. Device reputedly confessed to having paralysed Law, implicating her grandmother, Elizabeth Southerns, and Anne Whittle – rival folk healers with alleged supernatural powers – as well as Whittle's daughter, Anne. All four were locked in Lancaster Castle's prison. 

A Good Friday gathering held at the Device home, interpreted by Nowell as a coven meeting, resulted in more arrests. Oldfield says the newly accused, including wealthy Alice Nutter of Roughlee, were kept overnight at nearby Ashlar House, then forced to walk through the Forest of Bowland to Lancaster Castle where they were thrown into Well Tower dungeon. The prisoners were collectively accused of various kinds of maleficum (malevolent magical acts), including the murder of 10 locals. 

Nine-year-old Jennet Device was a crucial witness, giving testimony so convincing it doomed her mother, brother, sister and grandmother. Southerns died awaiting her verdict, but nine of the 12 accused were found guilty and hanged on Gallows Hill. Only Alice Grey was acquitted; Jennet Preston was hanged in her native Yorkshire.

Witch hunt fever continued for several decades more until the Age of Enlightenment, and witchcraft was eventually decriminalised in England in 1736.

The Pendle Hill trials remain some of the most famous and well-documented in English history, and the borough has never managed to shake its sinister past.

Oldfield says Pendle Hill's damp, bleak landscape naturally lends itself to stories of hauntings and sightings: "There's always been this atmosphere and spooky presence in Pendle Hill. It's like being in another country, even compared to West Lancashire".

Local author Stacey Halls, whose debut novel was set during the Pendle witch trials, finds being on the hill unnerving. "When you're up there on a cloudy day, which it always is up there, you literally cannot see. It's like being in a cloud… It's a bit unnatural, a bit spooky."

Some local wells, like St Chad's Well near Bull Hole Farm, still have anti-witch protection marks carved into them. Television programmes, including Most Haunted and The Haunted Hunts, explore Pendle to locate spirits, especially on Tynedale Farm, where the Nutter family lived for generations. 

For the 400th anniversary of the Pendle witch trials in 2012, local organisations funded the Pendle Witches' Way and the Lancashire Witches' Walk, which trace the imagined routes the accused may have taken to their imprisonment at Lancaster Castle.

Looking to follow in the steps of the twelve, I slip and slide back down Pendle Hill, towards hopefully drier, more solid ground that will give me a deeper sense of the region's history.

I start my homage in Newchurch-In-Pendle, the tiny village where several trial victims lived. Perched steeply on the hillside, it claims only 940 residents, and "when you drive [in], it still feels very much like it would have done when the trials took place," says Oldfield.

Often overlooked in favour of the nearby Lake and Peak Districts, this area of east Lancashire is equally scenic, with dramatic green hills, lush pastures and storybook cottages. "If you are looking for fresh air, stunning views all the way over to Yorkshire, and a nice walk, then the top of Pendle Hill is ideal," says Entwhistle.

As I stroll through the town, I find chilling spectres of its haunted past. Several homes display witch-inspired art, while others have horseshoes on their doors and holly trees planted outside – traditional protection from spells. Signposts depicting a witch on a broomstick guide me to the trailhead of the Pendle Witches' Way, which leads me to St Mary's Church – an imposing English Gothic parish in the shadow of Pendle Hill.

This churchyard is where, during her trial, Nutter was accused of having desecrated graves to rob bones and teeth. It is also the site of the Witches' Tomb, a large stone vault widely believed to belong to Nutter and her ilk.

Though headstone bears the Nutter name and enigmatic carvings of a skull, Oldfield is sceptical – Nutter was a common name in the area, and a convicted witch would "never have been allowed to be buried on consecrated ground".

Walking through the silent churchyard, I spot tombstones going further back in time, their names increasingly harder to read. Being so close to such unsettling history sends a shudder down my spine, so I look up at the church's tower, where I spot the unique, eye-shaped "Eye of God" carving – inscribed into the tower in the years after the trials to protect Newchurch-in-Pendle from evil spirits.

I continue my quest, driving down from Newchurch-in-Pendle through the rolling Lancashire countryside – first, to the picturesque village of Barley, the primary starting point for Pendle Hill hikers, and then to Roughlee, past a life-size outdoor metal sculpture of Nutter. I then park outside Ashlar House – a gabled stone cottage in the village of Fence. "That’s the only building still standing in Pendle that we know the witches went inside," says Oldfield.

Driving next through the Forest of Bowland, I am struck by the forest's dramatic valleys and wild heather fields. But any delight is curtailed as I imagine the accused's dread as they trudged the same stretch I'm now crossing in comfort. 

I finally arrive in the medieval city of Lancaster, the official end to both the Lancashire Witches' Walk and the Pendle Witches' Way. The 11th-Century Norman Lancaster Castle looms high on a hilltop in city centre, and I follow a handful of other tourists to the dungeon, where the accused awaited their deaths. The stone cell is damp, cramped and stifling cold – just a few moments inside is enough to make me yearn for daylight.

Sorely in need of a stiff drink after all that gloom, I pop down The Golden Lion pub. According to local myth, it's where the accused had a final drink before execution, says professor Charlotte Baker of Lancaster University. 

Between the pub's centuries-old wooden bar and its ancient fireplace, it's easy to understand why rumours have long circulated of ghosts and strange noises emanating from the place. Publican speculation is that the noises still come from the condemned who passed it on the way to their death. Any landlord whose pub has even a passing connection to the Pendle Witch Trials – they're all likely to insist a curse took place nearby – can't wait to speak about how haunted their establishment is, says Halls.

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Entwhistle is unsurprised the area is increasingly inundated with dark tourists. "It's a story that should have been turned into a Hollywood blockbuster, because it has deception, lies, superstition and religion."

While such fodder has helped to keep the victims' memories alive, Oldfield can't help but feel sorry for them, and the terrifying treatment they were subjected to.

"These were just uneducated, poor and pitiful people, who didn't have a hope in life. Healing gave them a sense of importance. Nowadays, you'd just avoid them. But because of the atmosphere of the time, they were killed."

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